Page 78 of The Half Sister

She’d spent the next two hours scanning Jess’s Instagram feed, which was being constantly uploaded with stories of her drinking and dancing. Kate didn’t know what she was looking for – perhaps a flash of Matt’s face or a flit of his hand in the corner of a shot. Either of which, in her saner moments, would mean nothing – yet right there and then it would have confirmed her worst fear: that the husband she trusted and adored was having an affair with her half sister.

She imagined the pair of them stumbling back to their hotel and kissing in the lift, unable to control themselves for a moment longer. They’d have gone to Matt’s room and Kate wondered what he would have thought about as he lowered himself on top of her. She doubts it would have been his baby’s scan the next morning.

‘Stop!’ she’d screamed out loud, in the hope that it would knock some sense into her. And for a second it did, but just as soon as she’d managed to banishthatthought from her mind, she was hit with a barrage of others.

There was seemingly no doubt now that Jess was her half sister – two hospital tags with the same date, had to be more than coincidental. But she still refused to believe she could be her father’s child. It’d be the more obvious choice of course, but as far as Kate’s concerned, he would never have betrayed his family. Betrayedher. No, if anyone was capable of doing that, it was her mother. But how had she managed to keep her pregnancy secret? Or had her husband known? Had he known that she’d been unfaithful, and been complicit in hiding the pregnancy, birthandadoption in order to keep their family unit together? That sounded more like him. But Rose had look so terrified when Kate had shown her the box from the loft, as if she’d seen a ghost, and the only reason for that would have been that she thought her world was about to implode. By inadvertently discovering the only memory her mother had of her third child, Kate had so nearly torn their family apart. Rose would have known that – that’s why she had snatched it from Kate’s grasp.

She’d almost felt sorry for her mother, responsible for forcing her to discard the cherished memento. But then she was reminded of how quickly Rose had pointed the finger at their father when Jess turned up – so eager to cast aspersions that she knew weren’t true – yet if it kept her secret safe, it seemed she had no moral responsibility to the man she’d been married to for forty years.

None of this explained what Jess actually wanted from them of course, though to cause as much distress and conflict as possible certainly seemed to be at the top of her agenda. Otherwise, why was she working with Matt? Why was she infiltrating Lauren’s life? Why was her flat set up for a baby?

‘And what the hell is she doing shacked up with my husband a hundred and fifty miles away?’ Kate had asked herself out loud.

The never-ending questions had circled in Kate’s head for most of the night, until she’d finally fallen asleep at dawn, wondering whether it was the past she should be worried about at all – because it seemed to be the future that was under threat.

She turns to Matt’s side of the bed now and hopes against hope that he’s there. When he’s not, she’s consumed not with a sense of foreboding, as she’d expected, but a sudden determination to find out exactly what Jess is up to. Because whatever it is, Kate will not let it beat her. ‘I’m a journalist, for God’s sake,’ she says under her breath.

She pulls her laptop towards her with a renewed sense of purpose and looks up the government website for births, deaths and marriages. It turns out it’s relatively easy to get a copy of an adoptee’s birth certificate; but not without their original surname and adopted parents’ names.

So she calls Jared, an old colleague of hers and a fearsome investigative reporter who leaves no stone unturned in his quest for the truth.

‘Hey stranger,’ he says as he picks up, making her feel as if she only ever calls him when she wants something. She resolves to call him more often when she doesn’t. ‘It’s a bit early for you, isn’t it?’

‘Hey, how you doing?’ says Kate. ‘Are you okay to talk?’

‘Always,’ he says, making Kate feel even worse.

‘I need to trace someone’s back story, but I don’t have their birth name.’

‘That shouldn’t be a problem,’ he says confidently. ‘Are they adopted or have they changed their name?’

‘Yes,’ says Kate, before thinking about it. ‘No, I don’t know.’

Jared laughs. ‘Well, which is it?’

She thinks back to what Finn told her. ‘Her adopted name is Harriet Oakley, but she’s been living as Jessica Linley more recently. I’m not sure if she’s changed it by deed poll or not.’

‘Sounds interesting.’

You havenoidea.

‘Do you have a date of birth?’

‘Yes, fifteenth of September, 1996.’

‘Okay, but no birth name?’

Kate sighs. ‘I can have a guess, but it would be a real stab in the dark.’

‘Anything might help,’ says Jared.

‘Okay, can you try Harriet Alexander?’ asks Kate, though even as she says it, she knows it’s highly unlikely. Firstly, she’s not her father’s child and why would her mother give Harry’s name to a child she was giving up for adoption? Even if her husbanddidknow about it?

‘Anything else you can tell me?’ asks Jared.

‘Actually, can you also look at Harriet Grainger?’ adds Kate, wondering if her mother would have given the childhermaiden name rather than that of her lover. It occurs to her for the first time, whether Rose even told Jess’s father that she was pregnant with his child.

How is she going to deal withthatwhen the time comes?

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